Some of the roots of antiracism
in anthroposophy and Waldorf education

How did Rudolf Steiner (1861-1925), as the main
founder of both anthroposophy and Waldorf education, view the nature of
the individual in relation to the "race" or culture he or she happened
to have or belong to at different times in history.

And how did he view the relation between the cultures
of the world at the end of the 19th and the beginning of the 20th century?

Below is a selection of some few examples of the
views he expressed throughout his life, 80-110 years ago, in a culture
permeated with thinking about people in terms of "race", and experiencing
the horrors of the first World War in history.

1888:

"The barometer of progress in the evolution
of humanity is ... the understanding of the ideal of freedom that is prevalent,
and the practical realization of that understanding. It is our conviction
that the present age has taken a step forward in this understanding which
is just as significant as the step initiated by the teaching of Christ:
'Let there be no difference between Jews and Greeks, between barbarians
and Scythians; but may you all be brothers in Christ.'"

"Value should be attached solely to the
mutual exchange between individuals. It is irrelevant whether someone is
a Jew or a German ... This is so obvious that one feels stupid even putting
it into words. So how stupid must one be to assert the opposite!"

"I have never been able to see anti-Semitism
as anything except a view that indicates in those who hold it an inferiority
of spirit, a lack of ability to make ethical judgments and a tastelessness
... that is an insult to any normal way of thinking."

"Anti-Semitism is a mockery of all belief
in ideas. It is a mockery especially of the idea that humanity rises above
any specialized form (tribe, race, nation) in which this humanity expresses
itself."

“Anti-Semitism is not only a danger for Jews, it
is also a danger for non Jews. It arises out of a way of thinking that
does not seriously strive for sound, straightforward judgments. Anti-Semitism
promotes this way of thinking. And anyone who thinks philosophically should
not just observe that passively. The belief in ideas will only return to
prevalence if we oppose the contrary unbelief in all areas as energetically
as possible.“

"Endeavors to achieve tolerance, to achieve
a general love of humanity: these have always been the forces that have
produced the great steps forward in human progress. It is the wish of the
theosophical stream to bring together in unity what individual cultural
movements strive to attain. It wants to overcome small-mindedness and intolerance.
For humanity can only achieve its goals nowadays if it unites in striving
for them."

"The highest principle of the Theosophical Society
is: 'To be the core of a fraternal community that encompasses the whole
of humanity without distinction of race, religion, social class, nationality
or gender.' In fact this is the sole principle that is regarded as binding
for members of this Society. All other efforts are merely intended as means
towards achieving the great goal as expressed in this intrinsic requirement."

"Other qualities which ... have to be
combated [on the path of spiritual development] are ... the making of distinctions
in human beings according to the outward characteristics of rank, sex,
race, and so forth. In our time it is difficult for people to understand
how the combating of such qualities can have anything to do with the heightening
of the faculty of cognition. But every spiritual scientist knows that much
more depends upon such matters than upon the increase of intelligence and
employment of artificial exercises. Especially can misunderstanding arise
if we believe that we must become foolhardy in order to be fearless; that
we must close our eyes to the differences between people, because we must
combat the prejudices of rank, race, and so forth. Rather is it true that
a correct estimate of all things is to be attained only wen we are no longer
entangled in prejudice. Even in the ordinary sense it is true that the
fear of some phenomenon prevents us from estimating it rightly; that a
racial prejudice prevents us from seeing into a man's soul. It is this
ordinary sense that the student must develop in all its delicacy and subtlety."

"The most important principle adopted by the theosophical
movement is: to form itself into the core of a general fraternity amongst
all human beings built on the love of one's fellows. In doing this the
theosophical movement will comprehensively prepare human beings for a world
view in which not mutual struggle but love is the creative and formative
element."

"It is a great achievement in our soul
life when we can learn through spiritual development to attain the ability
to recognize truly the common soul element that imbues the whole of the
human race, the unity that exists in the whole of humanity; it is a recognition
which we don't receive as an unconscious gift, but that we must consciously
set out to achieve. It is the task of the spiritual scientific world view
to in truth and reality develop this unified soul of all of humanity. This
is expressed in our first principle: to found a band of brotherhood across
the world as a whole, without concern for race, gender, color and so on.
That is the recognition of the soul, that is common to all humanity. All
the way into the passions, the purification must take place that makes
is self evident, that the same soul lives in your brother [as in yourself]."

"Christ leads [...] beyond the race to
all of humanity on Earth, to all peoples and races all over the planet.
Christ Jesus is the representative for that; he carries all of humanity
in himself [...] Christ Jesus is the one who encompasses the consciousness
of all of humanity as in an extract.

Kosmogonie (Cosmogony) (GA
94), lecture of 11 November 1906.

1907:

"A time will come when all racial and
tribal links come to an end. Individual human beings will become increasingly
different from one another. Mutual belonging will then no longer be a matter
of consanguinity but will arise through that which binds one soul to another.
This is the course human evolution will take."

The Theosophy of the Rosicrucian
(GA 99), lecture of 4 June 1907

1908:

"In primeval ages of humanity love occurred
between those linked together by the bonds of consanguinity, and very great
importance was attached to love having this physical basis of blood relatedness.
Christ came in order to spiritualize this love, in order on the one hand
to detach it from the bonds in which consanguinity enveloped it, and on
the other in order to bring in the strength and impulse for spiritual love
[...] 'Galilean' signifies 'the one of mixed race'. Christ Jesus goes to
Galilee, to those who are most mixed. From that which comes into being
in reproduction through mixing there will arise what is not bound to the
physical basis of love."

The Gospel of St John (GA
103), lecture of 23 May 1908

“For this reason we speak of ages of culture in
contra-distinction to races. All that is connected with the idea of race
is still a relic of the epoch preceding our own, namely the Atlantean.
We are now living in the period of cultural ages [...] Today the idea of
culture has superseded the idea of race.”

The Apocalypse of St John
(GA 104), London 1977, lecture of 20 June 1908.

"That constitutes the advancement in relation
to the former Atlantean time; that at that time a colony developed in a
small area, but that in our time the possibility is given to recruit those
who really understand the mission of the Earth out of all tribes all over
the Earth, people who understand to make Christ alive in themselves, to
develop the principle of brotherly love all over the Earth, and do it in
a proper sense, not in the sense of the Christian confessions, but in the
sense of true esoteric Christianity, that can spring from all cultures."

The Apocalypse of St John
(GA 104), London 1977, lecture of 24 June 1908.

"In regard to present humanity ... it no longer
makes sense to speak simply of the development of the races. In the true
sense of the word this development of the races applies only to the Atlantean
epoch ... External physiognomies then differed so greatly that one could
actually speak of different forms ... In our own epoch the concept of race
will gradually disappear along with all the differences that are relics
of earlier times. Thus everything that exists today in connection with
the [different] races are relics of the differentiation that took place
in Atlantean times. We can still speak of races but only in the sense that
the real concept of races is losing its validity."

"Now, in the present
time, we live in a time of transition in the most eminent sense of the
word. All group soulness shall be cast off. Just as the abyss between the
individual nations disappear more and more, just as the individual parts
of the different nations understand each other more and more, other forms
of group soulness will be cast off too, and what is individual in the individual
human will step into the foreground. We have thereby characterized something
that is very important in this development.

"If we want to understand it from another side,
we can say that that concept in which the group soulness most clearly comes
to expression, the concept of race, more and more loses its importance.

"If we go back to the time before the Atlantean
catastrophe, we see how the human races prepared themselves. During the
old Atlantean time people were grouped together according to the external
characteristics of their bodies even more than today. What we today calls
'races' are the relics of the marked differences that were common between
people during the old Atlantean time.

"But the concept of race in a proper sense was
only useful at the old Atlantis. Therefore we have not, as we count with
a real evolution of humanity, used the concept of race for the post-Atlantean
time. We don't speak of an Indian race, a Persian race and so on, as it
isn't proper any more. We speak of an Old Indian cultural epoch, of an
Old Persian cultural epoch and so on.

"It would have completely no sense if we were to
speak of that we in our time were preparing for a sixth 'race'. If we in
our time still see remains of the old Atlantean differences, remaining
old group soulness, so that you still can speak of a differentiation into
races - what is preparing itself for the sixth epoch consists specifically
in getting rid of and leaving behind that which is 'racial character'.
That is the important thing.

"Therefore it is necessary, that that movement
that is called the anthroposophical movement, and that shall prepare for
the sixth [Earth] epoch in its basic character, takes up especially this
task of getting rid of that which related to 'racial character' and to
unite people of all races, of all nations and in this way bridges this
differentiation, these differences, this abyss that exists between different
groups of people. Because that which are old racial points of view has
a physical character, and that which will develop into the future has a
spiritual character.

”That is the reason why it is so urgently necessary
that our anthroposophical movement is a spiritual movement, that looks
at that which is spiritual and overcomes specifically that which is based
on physical differences out of the force of this spirituality.

"It is completely
understandable that every movement has its childhood
illnesses and that at the beginning of the theosophical movement one
described what it is about as if the evolution of the Earth so to speak
was differentiated into seven epochs - they were called 'main races' [here
'main races' refers to the theosophical concept of
seven "root races"] - and that every 'root race' was differentiated into seven 'sub-races', and that everything would repeat itself that way for ever, so that you for ever could speak of seven 'races' and seven 'sub-races'.

"But one has to overcome
this childhood illness and become clear that
the concept of race ceases to have any meaning / importance specifically
in our time.

"Something else is
preparing itself - something that in the most eminent sense has to do with
the human individuality - the ever more increasing individualization of
man. What is important is that this development
of the individuality is supported in the right way, and the anthroposophical
movement has to support this development of individuality in man in the
right way.''

“We can best serve mankind if we develop
our particular talents so as to offer them to the whole of humanity as
a sacrifice which we bring to the progressive development of culture. We
must learn to understand this. We must learn to understand that it would
not redound to the credit of Spiritual Science, if it did not contribute
to the evolution of man, Angel and Archangel, but were to support the convictions
of one people at the expense of another.

"It is no part of Spiritual Science to assist
in imposing the confessional beliefs of one continent upon another continent.
If the religious teachings of the East were to prevail in the West, or
vice versa, that would be a complete denial of anthroposophical teaching.
What alone accords with anthroposophical teaching is that we should unselfishly
dedicate the best that is in us, our sympathy and compassion, to the well-being
of all humanity. And if we are self-contained, yet live not for ourselves
but for all human beings, then that is true anthroposophical tolerance.”

The Mission of the Individual
Folk Souls (GA 121), lecture of 17 June 1910.

1912:

“On the day when it comes about that the
Brahmin not only loves and understands the Brahmin, the Pariah the Pariah,
the Jew the Jew, and the Christian the Christian; but when the Jew is able
to understand the Christian, the Pariah the Brahmin, the American the Asiatic,
as a human being, and put himself in his place, then one will know how
deeply it is felt in a Christian way when we say: 'All human beings must
feel themselves to be brothers, no matter what their religious creed may
be.' ”

“The trend which will become
more and more general over the globe ... is no kind of approach to a new
group-soul, but far rather the laying aside of the attributes of the group-soul.
Intimately connected with this is the fact that the spiritual guidance
of human beings will become more and more a matter individual to each one;
they will have greater inner freedom in this respect. If Theosophy is to
keep faith with its good old principles ... it will not cherish groundless
hopes of a future culture emanating from one particular race.”

“Our Society unites within a common stream
members of very differing races or peoples who are today hostile to one
another ... We are endeavoring to bring together again what has been scattered
all over the world; here representatives of various nations embrace one
another fraternally, they become brothers within our circle.”

Mitteleuropa zwischen Ost
und West (Central Europe between East and West) (GA 174a), Dornach 1982,
lecture of 13 September 1914.

“We can sense that the principle ... of working
without any distinction between race, color, nationality and so on is fundamentally
so closely bound up with the deeper being of our Movement that anyone who
agrees with the profound seriousness of spiritual-scientific truths must
realize that it would be nonsensical not to stand up for this first principle.”

Mitteleuropa zwischen Ost
und West (Central Europe between East and West) (GA 174a), Dornach 1982,
lecture of 3 December 1914.

1915:

“The very reason why we are working to
reach a world view based on spiritual science is so that humanity may struggle
to free itself from feelings of merely national concern as opposed to feelings
concerned with humanity as a whole ... so that something may spread to
encompass the whole earth, something that goes beyond all possible differentiations
...”

Die geistigen Hintergründe
des Ersten Weltkriegs (The spiritual background of the First World War)
(GA 174b), Dornach 1994, lecture of 14 February 1915.

1916:

“Christ is our savior who keeps humankind
from being fragmented into groups ... Christianity lives wherever people
are able to understand this union of all humanity through Christ. In the
future, it will not matter much whether what Christ is will still be called
by that name. However, a lot will depend on our finding in Christ the spiritual
uniter of humanity and accepting that external diversity will increase
more and more.”

“... someone speaking today of the ideal
of races and nations and of tribal affiliation speaks of decadent impulses
of humanity. And if such a person imagines that with such ideals he is
placing before humanity ideals that are progressive, then this is not true.
Because through nothing will humanity be brought more into decadence than
if the ideals of race, nation and blood continue to hold sway.”

The Fall of the Spirits
of Darkness (GA 177), Bristol 1993, lecture of 26 October 1917.

1919:

"... as regards ... what is independent
of our bodily makeup we are all individually made; each one of us is his
or her own self, an individual. With the exception of the far less important
differences that show up as racial or national differences ... but which
are (if you have a sense for this you cannot help noticing it) mere trifles
by comparison with differences in individual gifts and skills: with the
exception of these we are all equal as human beings ... as regards our
external, physical humanity. We are equal as human beings, here in the
physical world, specifically in that we all have the same human form and
all manifest a human countenance. The fact that we all bear a human countenance
and encounter one another as external, physical human beings... this makes
us equal on this footing. We differ from one another in our individual
gifts which, however, belong to our inner nature."

Education as a Force for
Social Change (in GA 192), Hudson 1997, lecture of 23 April 1919.

1920:

“And it is national chauvinism that is
ringing through the whole civilized world today. This is merely the social
counterpart of the utterly reactionary world-view that tries to trace everything
back to inherited characteristics.”

New Spirituality and the
Christ Experience of the Twentieth Century (GA 200), London & Hudson
1988, lecture of 31 October 1920.

1923:

”Those who are fanatics and find their
way into Anthroposophy through their fanaticism rather than through their
inner life are the very ones who select the sharpest terms of abuse for
all that is American ... It is not our task as Europeans to grumble about
the Americans all the time, for it is up to us to found a civilization
across the whole earth that is put together out of all that is best.”

“The first thing Europeans should learn
is that they must not just carry their knowledge to Asia; they should learn
very attentively what the Asians know. Then they would know, for example,
what Tibetan wisdom is. So then they would not tell the Asians things in
the old way but in the new way, making use of what Tibetan wisdom is. By
respecting the culture of the others they would achieve something. This
is what Europe must learn.”

“Seeing how Europeans carry on over in Asia
really makes one sweat blood. What they do destroys everything Asia has
and leads absolutely nowhere. The real trouble of course is that Europe
itself is in trouble and that it is difficult to imagine how Europe will
ever be able to get out of this trouble. The great trouble is that Europe
itself is in decline and that it cannot get away from all the cultural
damage in which it is stuck if people do not make up their minds to take
on a genuine culture of the spirit. Many people still do not believe this.
And this is how it has come about that everyone coming to Europe from Asia
has reached the conclusion: These Europeans, they are really all barbarians.

“... They have reached this conclusion because
so much of the ancient wisdom of the spirit and the ancient knowledge of
the spirit has still been preserved in Asia; because of this, what Europeans
know appears to Asians to be childish. All the things so much admired in
Europe appear terribly childish to people in Asia!

“... In spiritual culture Asians are today
still ahead of Europeans. And if we in Europe cannot find anything better
than what the Asians already have by way of a spiritual culture, then why
should one take missions and suchlike to Asia in the first place? They
are not needed there!”